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Language Quotes

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Language Quotes

“H. L Mencken's Dictionary of the American Language supplies a long list of slang terms for being drunk, but the Irish are no slouches, either. They're spannered, rat-arsed, cabbaged, and hammered; ruined, legless, scorched, and blottoed; or simply trolleyed or sloshed. In Kerry, you're said to be flamin'; in Waterford, you're in the horrors; and in Cavan, you've gone baloobas, a tough one to wrap your tongue around if you ARE baloobas. In Donegal, you're steamin', while the afflicted in Limerick are out of their tree.”

IfsLongSaidLanguageTermGoneTreeHorrorToughTongueListsDrunkRatsRuinedWrapsDictionarySuppliesSlangHammeredLimerickBeing DrunkAmerican Language
Author:Bill Barich
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“We can no longer communicate with the apes by direct language, nor can we understand, without special study, their modes of communication which we have long since replaced by more elaborate forms. But it is at least presumable that they could still detect in our speech, at least when it is public and elaborate, the underlying tone values with which it began. Thus if we could take a gibbon ape to a college public lecture, he would not understand it, but he would "get a good deal of it." This is all the students get anyway.”

IfsLongStillsFormValuesLanguageDealsStudySpecialStudentsCollegeCommunicationSpeechDirectCommunicateToneReplacedLecturesApes
Book:Leacock on Life
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“The English language may hold a more disagreeable combination of words than "The doctor will see you now." I am willing to concede something to the phrase "Have you anything to say before the current is turned on?" That may be worse for the moment, but it doesn't last so long. For continued, unmitigating depression, I know nothing to equal "The doctor will see you now." But I'm not narrow-minded about it. I'm willing to consider other possibilities.”

KnowsMayLongMomentsLastsLanguagePossibilityWillingEqualDoctorsCurrentsCombinationPhrasesEnglish LanguageDisagreeableNarrow-minded
Book:Love Conquers All
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“In truth, the best long-term explanations about our ancient counterparts can be found in the paintings, sculpture, crafts, tools of utility, language and architecture left behind. These are the building blocks of civilization we call culture. These are what we call 'the arts.”

LongArtCultureFoundLeftLanguageTermBehindsBuildingPaintingCivilizationToolsAncientArchitectureBlockCraftsExplanationLong TermSculptureLeft BehindUtilityCounterpartsBuilding Blocks
Author:Edward J. Fraughton
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“Most English speakers do not have the writer's short fuse about seeing or hearing their language brutalized. This is the main reason, I suspect, that English is becoming the world's universal tongue: English-speaking natives don't care how badly others speak English as long as they speak it. French, once considered likely to become the world's lingua franca, has lost popularity because those who are born speaking it reject this liberal attitude and become depressed, insulted or insufferable when their language is ill used.”

WorldLongReasonCareUsedLostSpeakLanguageBornAttitudeSeeingBecomingUniversalIllDon't CareHearingTongueRejectsSuspectsSpeakersPopularityInsultedFuseSpeak EnglishInsufferableEnglish Speaking
Book:There's a Country in My Cellar
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“My friends: Music is the language of spirits. Its melody is like the frolicsome breeze that makes the strings quiver with love. When the gentle fingers of Music knock at the door of our feelings, they awaken memories that have long lain hidden in the depths of the Past. The sad strains of Music bring us mournful recollections; and her quiet strains bring us joyful memories. The sound of strings makes us weep at the departure of a dear one, or makes us smile at the peace God has bestowed upon us.”

LongFeelingsPastSpiritLanguageSoundMemoriesDoorsQuietMusic IsMy FriendsFingersDepthDearGentleStringsMelodyJoyfulStrainBreezeRecollectionDepartureQuiverDear OnesCreating Beauty
Author:Khalil Gibran
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“What does purpose mean? It means the deepest desire for our short lives to mean something. . . . To speak a language of purpose is to return to first principles and to be able to answer, in plain English, the plain questions of Why? Why should we chip in to help someone else? Why should we defer gratification? Why should we care about the long term? Why should we trust anyone who seems to be limiting our ability to do what we want?”

WantShouldFirstsMeanLongDoeHelpingSeemsCareAbleDesirePurposeSpeakLanguageTermAbilityAnswersPrinciplesReturnIntentionLong TermChipsGratificationShort LifePlain English
Author:Eric Liu
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“The Da Vinci Code may well be the only novel ever written that begins with the word 'renowned'... I think what enabled the first word to tip me off that I was about to spend a number of hours in the company of one of the worst prose stylists in the history of literature was this. Putting curriculum vitae details into complex modifiers on proper names or definite descriptions is what you do in journalistic stories about deaths; you just don't do it in describing an event in a narrative... Why did I keep reading? Because London Heathrow is a long way from San Francisco International.”

ThinkingWayFirstsWellsMayLongBookStoriesReadingLiteratureNamesLanguageHoursNumbersCompanyNovelWrittenWorstEventsComplexesInternationalDetailsLondonNarrativeCodeProseDescriptionDefiniteLong WaySan FranciscoDescribingCurriculumStylistJournalisticRenownedDa Vinci Code
Author:Geoffrey K. Pullum
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“No religion is suddenly rejected by any people; it is rather gradually outgrown. None sees a religion die; dead religions are like dead languages and obsolete customs: the decay is long and - like the glacier march - is perceptible only to the careful watcher by comparisons extending over long periods.”

PeopleLongDiesLanguageAtheismPeriodsCarefulPositive AtheismComparisonMarchCustomsDecayRejectedObsoleteExtendingWatchersGlaciers
Book:Has Humanity Gained from Unbelief?: Two Nights Debate Between Marsden Gibson and Charles Bradlaugh at Newcastle-on-Tyne
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“I grew up in the theater, and you can't improvise Shakespeare and Ibsen. You have to speak the language. But obviously, in a contemporary film, there's often room for improvisation and spontaneous things that happen. As long as I know what I'm trying to achieve in the scene, and when something comes up, I know that the response is genuine, I'm comfortable. That's really how I build everything.”

KnowsTryingLongHappensFilmSpeakLanguageRoomsAchieveGrewSceneComfortableGrew UpTheaterResponseCome UpGenuineContemporarySpontaneousImprovisationIbsen
Author:Victor Garber
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“I write with two things in mind. I want to be right with my fellow economists. After all, I've made my life as a professional economist, so I'm careful that my economics is as it should be. But I have long felt that there's no economic proposition that can't be stated in clear, accessible language. So I try to be right with my fellow economists, but I try to have an audience of any interested, intelligent person.”

WantShouldWritingTryingMindPersonsLongMadeTwoLanguageFeltAudienceClearEconomicEconomicsIntelligentFellowsCarefulTwo ThingsEconomistPropositionsIntelligent Person
Author:John Kenneth Galbraith
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“Chloe Honum's brilliant first book The Tulip-Flame traces an identity forming within radically divergent but interlocking systems: a family traumatized by the mother's suicide, a failed relationship, the practice of ballet, a garden-each strict, exacting. And with 'a crow's sky-knowing mind,' Honum in every case transfigures emotion by way of elegant language and formal restraint. Chloe Honum is 'one astounding flame' of a poet, and I predict a long-lasting one.”

WayMindFirstsLongBookMotherLanguageEmotionPracticeCasesKnowingSkyIdentityPoetGardenSuicideBrilliantFlamesLastingBalletFormalStrictRestraintElegantCrowDivergentChloeLong LastingFailed Relationship
Author:Claudia Emerson
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“The most successful of the Tartar princes assumed the military command, to which he was entitled by the superiority either of merit or of power. He was raised to the throne by the acclamations of his equals; and the title of Khan expresses, in the language of the North of Asia, the full extent of the regal dignity. The right of hereditary succession was long confined to the blood of the founder of the monarchy; and at this moment all the Khans, who reign from Crimea to the wall of China, are the lineal descendants of the renowned Zingis.”

LongMomentsLanguageHistorySuccessfulBloodMilitaryWallDignityRaisedChinaCommandTitlesMeritFoundersEntitledThronesSuperiorityReignAsiaConfinedMonarchySuccessionRoman EmpireDescendantsHereditaryRegalRenownedCrimeaMilitary Command
Book:History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire V2: the History Focus
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“There are many deaf people who couldn't imagine living in a marriage without someone who doesn't speak their language. For me, I believe that hearing or deaf is fine as long as both parties are willing to communicate in each other's language. But if there's no communication, then the marriage, I believe, will be difficult if not doomed.”

PeopleIfsBelieveLongSpeakLanguageI BelieveDifficultPartyImagineWillingCommunicationFineCommunicateHearingDoomedDeafDeafnessNo Communication
Author:Marlee Matlin
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“History is driven, over the long haul, by culture - by what men and women honor, cherish, and worship; by what societies deem to be true and good, and by the expressions they give to those convictions in language, literature, and the arts; by what individuals and societies are willing to stake their lives on.”

MenGivingLongArtCultureLiteratureIndividualLanguageWillingExpressionHonorWorshipMen And WomenConvictionDrivenBeing TrueCherishStakesHaulLong HaulIndividuals And Society
Book:The Cube and the Cathedral: Europe, America, and Politics Without God
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“Before I knew that I was Jewish or a girl I knew that I was a member of the working class. At a time when I had not yet grasped the significance of the fact that in my house English was a second language, or that I wore dresses while my brother wore pants, I knew--and I knew it was important to know--that Papa worked hard all day long.”

KnowsLongImportantHardFactsGirlHouseLanguageWorkClassBrotherMembersDressesMy BrotherSignificancePantsWorking ClassPapa
Book:The romance of American Communism
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“The etymologist finds the deadest word to have been once a brilliant picture. Language is fossil poetry. As the limestone of the continent consists of infinite masses of the shells of animalcules, so language is made up of images or tropes, which now, in their secondary use, have long ceased to remind us of their poetic origin.”

LongHas BeensMadeUseEarthLanguageMassInfiniteBrilliantPoeticContinentsShellsFossilsTropesLimestone
Book:Essays and Lectures
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“In my judgment the people of no nation can lose their liberty so long as a Bill of Rights like ours survives and its basic purposes are conscientiously interpreted, enforced and respected so as to afford continuous protection against old, as well as new, devices and practices which might thwart those purposes. I fear to see the consequences of the Court's practice of substituting its own concepts of decency and fundamental justice for the language of the Bill of Rights as its point of departure in interpreting and enforcing that Bill of Rights.”

PeopleWellsLongMightLawPurposeLanguageNationsLosesJusticeLibertyPracticeRightsJudgmentConceptsConsequenceConstitutionFundamentalsBillsCourtProtectionDevicesDecencyDepartureBill Of RightsInterpreting
Author:Hugo Black
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“in order to confer their lost Nationality upon exiled Jews , the British with the help of the League of Nations began to rehabilitate the old Hebrew country, Palestine, with its long lost children. The Jews had maintained their race, religion, culture and language; and all they wanted was their natural territory to complete their Nationality. The reconstruction of the Hebrew Nation on Palestine is just an affirmation of the fact that Country, Race, Religion, Culture and Language must exist unequivocally together to form the Nation idea.”

ChildrenLongIdeasCountryFactsHelpingWantedTogetherFormOrderCultureLostLanguageNationsNaturalRaceJewBritishLeagueTerritoryAffirmationPalestineNationalityHebrewReconstructionLeague Of NationsCulture And LanguageLost Child
Author:M. S. Golwalkar
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“If you're a writer and you are at all inclined to speak as a Christian in some way, you realize very quickly that the conventional language is pretty much useless. It takes a long time to get past that, or it has taken me a long time. People in conventional Christianity have spoken lightly and sometimes frivolously of God for a long time. It's a word that needs to be used sparingly, in my opinion.”

PeopleIfsWayNeedsLongSometimesChristianPastUsedSpeakLanguageRealizingChristianityOpinionTakenLong TimeUselessConventional
Author:Wendell Berry
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“I LOVE WAL-MART. I CONSIDER MY JOKES TO BE VERY JEUVINILLE. STUFF A 14 YEAR OLD WOULD LAUGH AT BECAUSE THATS THE SENCE OF HUMOR I HAVE. ALL THE STUFF I TALK ABOUT MAY NOT BE APPROPRIATE FOR CHURCH GROUPS HOWEVER WAL-MART AINT SUNDAY SCHOOL. AS LONG AS I DIDNT USE OFFENSIVE FOUL LANGUAGE I KNEW ID BE FINE. WAL-MART GETS IT, THATS WHY THEY BLOW AWAY THE COMPETITION. BESIDES ITS THERE STORE THEY CAN DO WHAT THEY WANT. THATS AMERICA BABY!”

WantYearsMayLongUseSchoolAmericaLanguageStuffCan DoChurchLaughingGroupsBabyFineJokesCompetitionBlowStoresAppropriateSundayOffensiveFoulSunday SchoolFoul Language
Author:Larry the Cable Guy
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